This year, eighth-grader Sukanya Roy spelled "periscii" and "cymotrichous" to take the title not even my Microsoft Word spell check recognizes those words, becoming the fourth American of Indian descent to win the bee in a row, and the ninth to win it in the past 13 years.

Eastern time, roughly an hour and 15 minutes after the spelling bee was scheduled to end, a winner finally took the trophy: eighth-grader Sukanya Roy, who spelled "cymotrichous" correctly to take the title